


Walk in Newness of Life

by reddish



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Angst and Fluff and Smut, Bath Sex, F/M, Implied Varric Romance, Polyamory Negotiations, post-Revelations
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-11
Updated: 2015-10-11
Packaged: 2018-04-25 20:52:14
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,203
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4976122
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/reddish/pseuds/reddish
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This story takes place after <a href="http://archiveofourown.org/works/3604653">To Start Again</a>. Rook Brosca and Blackwall/Thom take some time to restore themselves, to talk, and to, well. Be together.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Walk in Newness of Life

**Author's Note:**

> Rook Brosca is in a poly V relationship with Varric and Blackwall, which is referenced at one point. Also there's unprotected sex under the pretense that other methods exist to handle contraception. Just for your safety and information before jumping in. OKAY BYE.

Rook made sure the door was closed securely behind her, then turned to face Blackwall. Thom? They still weren’t sure which was right. Maybe neither were.

Her private bathing area consisted of a well-sized square indentation in the stones that could be filled and drained. She’d chosen to have it filled with water just short of warm enough to cook them, which was how Rook liked it, and she thought he might need it.

“You don’t have to…" he started, but the words fell flat on his lips.

“I know. Do you want me to leave?”

About that, he was adamant. “No. Please.”

Rook approached him, laying her hands on his belt and the fastenings of his armor, pulling at them with purpose. “You can’t take a bath in this stuff,” she admonished him with a twinkling glance upward.

With a heavy sigh, Blackwall shrugged off the padded coat he wore, revealing the man beneath. Rook winced at the sight of him. There were bruises she hadn’t expected to see.

“Orlesians have long memories,” he said solemnly. “I deserved them. And more.”

“Stop,” Rook pleaded. “Take off your pants.”

The incongruence snapped Blackwall’s attention to the present, and he almost laughed. “As you wish, my lady.”

“That’s more like it.” Her smile felt a bit forced, but she needed him to know it was okay. Even if everything wasn’t entirely okay. It _could_ be.

He stood bare before her, not for the first time in practice, but there was a newness to it that made her feel like she should give him privacy. There was shame still weighing heavy in his brows as he observed her looking at him. This was all so uneven.

Rook stepped away and pulled her shirt over her head, kicked off her shoes, left her pants in a pile on the ground. She met his eyes just as they darted away from her.

Trying to draw him back, Rook touched his chest, just above a patch of bruised skin. He still winced. She took hold of his hand, and put it against her chest wrap.

“Go on,” she urged. “I’m still here. You can still touch me.”

An argument rested behind his tired eyes, but it was one they’d had before. One they’d probably run up against even more in the coming weeks. There was no denying they had a lot to talk about. He had a lot of wounds to heal, and they weren’t all his.

But as his hand pulled her underclothes away, she stood with him on even ground and she felt the spark of connection, of trust, reignite. His fingers were delicate against her bare skin, and his breathing hitched.

“Get in the bath,” she suggested, worried that she’d lose focus if she let his hands linger.

“Aye,” he said quietly, and he obeyed. He hissed at the contact as he lowered himself in. “Andraste’s ass, woman. You making a soup out of me?”

Rook laughed and climbed in after him, grateful the servants underfilled it for her size. He leaned back against the edge, and she nestled in between his legs, resting on her knees. He relaxed as she found her space, and she watched him melt into the water and against the back of the tub.

“You must be tired,” she said, finally at a vantage point where she could study his face clearly. She expected him to look older or more grizzled or something. It was there, but something looked lighter, too. She hoped it wasn’t just a trick of the candles’ light.

He shook his head. “I don’t know what I feel. I was prepared to take my punishment. I was prepared for this all to end. And now… now there’s another day ahead. One I didn’t plan for.”

Rook pursed her lips in thought, then grabbed a washcloth and leaned forward, their bodies just shy of touching in the water. She dabbed the cloth at his neck, getting some of the long road he’d traveled off of him.

“Is it one you wanted?” she asked, as though it were only idle chatter.

“How can you ask me that?” His voice splintered at the end of the question.

Rook sat back and met his eyes, the saddest she’d ever seen them. Her chest ached.

“You have to want to be here for this to work,” she said, keeping her hands busy at his chest and neck, to keep her voice steady. “I can’t keep you here, no matter what name you use, if you want to run away again. If you want this to be over. I was selfish when I saved you, because I didn’t want my days to not have you in them. But… I can’t keep you in a life you wanted to leave. I can’t be your anchor.”

“I want you,” he protested. “I want this. But I couldn’t… I didn’t deserve…” He paused, his hands clenching into fists in his frustration. “Blast it. Look, I can’t tell you anything you don’t already know. I ran like a coward; I’ve always run. And I’m only back here now because you brought me here in chains -- how can I tell you that I want to be at your side? How could you trust a word I say? All I can do is… be here. Stay here. If you’ll have me.”

He was so tense, fighting against himself, even there. She pressed her lips to his for a short moment.

“I know you’re here,” she said, winding a hand through his hair. “It’s different now, isn’t it? I know you didn’t plan to be back here, I just… I needed to hear that you wanted to try. You don’t need to know what tomorrow is going to be like. I just need to know you’ll be there. The rest is just… details.”

“I’m here,” he pressed the word as firmly as he could. “And you… you’ve seen all I’ve had to hide, and you still...”

“I still what?”

“Don’t make me ask it,” he breathed. “Don’t be so cruel.”

Rook pulled him downward by a small margin, their faces even. “Of course I still love you. I never stopped.”

The wetness in his eyes was no trick of light. “How?”

She sighed, raising the cloth to his cheeks and catching his tears along with the grime of the past few days. “I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but I’m good at seeing things worth loving in people. And it didn’t take a whole lot of work to see yours. You won me over with your weird charm and your dedication to the Wardens, even when I found out you weren’t really one of us. By then, you were making dirty jokes at me and still blushing when I returned them. And you fought darkspawn like someone who’d been hurt by them before, but you hated nobles the same way. And now I get it.”

Rook shrugged and squeezed the cloth clean. “I never thought you were running from _me_. I just know it’s hard to stop running at all, even if there’s something you want. And it was scary to think I’d never see you again, _because_ I love you.”

His broad hand swept over her hair, holding her head with an affectionate sadness. “I’m so sorry that I gave you cause to doubt me or my feelings for you. The words aren’t enough, they never can be, but I need you to know. I’m sorry for leaving you there. I’m sorry for going to face my death, without letting you in.”

It was her turn to cry, and she let it happen. What was a little more water in a tub, anyway? She covered his hand with hers, wet fingers sliding over his dry, calloused skin.

“I know you are. And I forgive you, Thom. I just… I hope you can learn to forgive yourself.”

He winced at the name; she felt it in his grip, but she held strong to him. It was only the second time she’d used the name, and it felt foreign to her, but it was one she could learn to love.

“I… need to do something,” he sighed.

“What’s wrong?”

“Just give me a second,” he asked. He worked his hand free from her grasp and shifted past her in the bath, approaching the center of it. Once there, he leaned back and submerged himself with no hesitation, re-appearing before she could get panicked. When he returned to her, strands of his beard hung in tendrils to his neck, while the rest clung together and dripped freely like his long hair.

“Don’t you dare shake that out,” she warned, more confused than anything else.

He opened one eye tentatively as the water ran off his face, and she relaxed a little when he let out a small chuckle. “I’m trying, my lady. To work past this. And with you at my side, I know I can live a life I can take pride in. I just… I want to leave this shit behind. Not erased, but behind me.”

“Sometimes it takes a fresh start,” Rook agreed, sliding forward so she could run her hands over his wet hair. She got the idea now. “You can get it all off. Be a new man. But the same man.”

His hands slid down her back, linking at her waist and holding her to him. He pressed his forehead to hers, and his wet mustache tickled her nose.

“Call me Thom again,” he whispered.

Rook felt gooseflesh ripple over her, and she knew it wasn’t because the water was starting to cool. “I love you, Thom.”

His body tensed again, but his hands stayed firm against her. A soft breath escaped his small smile. “I love you, too.”

Rook’s fingers played at the black and white hair on his chest, leaving droplets of water behind that looked like stars. “How’s it feel to be him again?”

In answer, Thom slid one hand up her back, cradling the back of her head and pulling her to himself. He kissed her, hard, with a hunger that might have been building for years. She felt it in the way he clung to her, and she wanted to sate it. Her legs parted, shifted so that she sat on his lap. His blood was stirring, and it made her moan around his tongue when she felt it.

Her hand eagerly sought his arousal, and he grunted as her fingers wrapped around him, slid over his skin so fluidly beneath the water’s surface. He was smooth, growing firm in her grasp, and his hips pushed into her touch instantly. She loved it when he begged.

Soon, his lips and teeth traveled to her throat, leaving a path of water that cooled against her skin on the way down. She shivered as one of his hands cupped the weight of her breast, a rough thumb brushing her nipple.

Rook stroked him slowly, and he pinched her sensitive skin between his fingers, a light tug that brought the air out of her.

“Oh, yes,” she whispered, and he grunted against her skin. She leaned away and arched her back, giving his mouth purchase to her breast. His slick tongue found her raised nipple, sending hot lightning through her, only intensified when he drew her into his mouth and began to suck.

Then his hand got busy. He knew her body well enough by that point, knew what she liked, knew what she wanted from him. And for her part, she trusted him entirely.

Beneath the water, Thom’s fingers traveled the curls between her legs, finding her clit after a tantalizing, intentional exploration, rubbing in small circles. The water made everything feel like time was slowing down, and it only intensified his touch.

“Fuck,” she grunted, squeezing his cock in her grip and speeding her strokes. He groaned at her breast, and her patience was running thin. It was never really her strong suit to begin with. “Thom, please.”

As though he didn’t hear her, he switched to her other breast and repeated his attentions, stoking her fire to greater heights. It was infuriatingly wonderful, until his fingers slowed against her. Before she could ask, he parted her lower lips, her own slickness greeting the heated water, and slid one finger inside. She bucked against him, and he added a second, beginning to rock his hand against her.

“Thom,” she hissed, pulling herself upright. “I need you. Now.”

He chuckled, lifting his head from her. “My lady gets what my lady wants.”

He repositioned himself, giving her more room to straddle him and keep herself slightly out of the water. It was cold on her bare cheeks, but she didn’t care. Not now. His erection peeked out of the water, and she was careful as she slid down over him. Her caution was unneeded; she took him deep as he pushed up to meet her downward thrust, and she gripped his shoulders for stability as it washed over them both.

Thom moaned some unintelligible curse, and Rook rolled her hips against him to make him do it again. She kept her eyes focused on him, and though they were both near shaking, neither broke away and let sensation shut their sight. They both needed this.

As he held her hips loosely but steadily, Rook found a rhythm. Fast, but not enough to cause a mess of water to splash over the room. It was more than enough for her. After all, he was here. He was safe. He was _hers._

Heartrate building, thighs burning, she started gasping between short moans.  Thom’s fingers found her clit again, and through the haze of his own pleasure he still focused on hers. With labored, intoxicated breaths he pushed up against her to match her time, as much as he could from his position. It was all too much.

She felt her pressure rising, her blood moving her toward her end, and as he heard her breathing  change, his motions became jerkier, more desperate.

“I’m gonna come,” she panted, gripping tight to his shoulders as she drove herself there.

“Go on, love,” he begged, “let me feel you.”

The command sealed it. She rolled against him one more time, the flick of his rough fingers on her triggering a pulse that stormed through her body until the waves crashed within her. She swore loudly, then breathlessly, pushing herself through each crest to rock against him and drive the feeling deeper through her.

“Rook,” he panted, “I’m going to. Should I--”

Rook shook her head, gripping his hair with one hand and continuing her body’s movements against him. Her voice was a rasp when she spoke into his ear. “Do it, Thom. Come for me.”

With a loud groan, Thom pushed upward one last time. His hands dug into her thighs as he came into her, and through the dwindling heat of the tub, through the aftershocks of orgasm, she felt him empty himself. Through it all, she clutched him as tightly as he held her, breast to breast.

Beyond their strained breaths, silence filled the room. Rook was too tired to worry about the servants, or anyone else, having overheard. She imagined he felt even moreso, and the way he slumped in her arms confirmed it.

“I love you,” he said, almost a growl. It was just his voice when he was spent.

“I love you, too,” she said, followed by a throaty, hoarse laugh. “I don’t know if this got you any cleaner.”

“I don’t really care,” he chuckled back. “I could use that bed now.”

“Aw, my old man is tuckered out.”

“Oh, the teasing starts already?” Thom lifted his head and glowered at her, then kissed her nose. “I must truly be back in your good graces.”

“You know it,” Rook confirmed before kissing his nose in return. “Just… give me a second for my legs to work and I’ll get off you.”

“A torture I can probably survive.”

Rook laughed and drew herself off of him, always a little off-balance by the feeling left behind. He made a small sound that told her she wasn’t alone, though she couldn’t fathom what it was like on the other side of it.

Despite protests to the contrary, they both took some time with the cooling waters to clean themselves. It felt like the right thing to do, after all. In a short enough time, they were fresh, comfortable, and pressed close in the safety of her bed. Rook was nuzzled in against Thom’s chest, and he held one arm behind her, the other resting on his stomach, her hand covering his.

“Is it right for me to be up here?” Thom asked. “I… don’t want to intrude on time you might have spent elsewhere.”

She soothed him by lightly stroking his arm. “Varric has his own space, and he knew I would need time with you tonight. I know you worry, but I promise, he likes you. He likes us.”

Thom’s brow furrowed, but he relented. “I just don’t want to cause any more damage than I already have.”

Rook nodded. “I get it. But… you didn’t hurt him, not really. He’s worried about me in all of this, but. That’s for us to sort out. I mean, you and him talking probably wouldn’t hurt, but us spending time together isn’t causing a problem.”

“Right. I can do that. I think.”

“He’s not going to shoot you,” Rook teased. “Bianca is more bark than bite.”

He sighed in exasperation, but it was not unkind. “You never let things crawl too far under your skin, do you?”

She shrugged in his arms. “It doesn’t seem worth it most of the time. And the things I do let get to me, I try to stay positive about. It’s just… how I get through all this wild shit. It’s how I find the people who matter to me. It’s how I survive when I get hurt. I don’t really like the other options, you know?”

“I know,” he said before pressing his lips to the top of her head. “Thank you.”

“For what?” She glanced upward.

“Being you. Showing me a life worth living. Believing I was worth saving. All of it, and more.”

“Oh, _that_ ,” Rook giggled sleepily. “Well, you’re welcome.”

Thom shifted beneath her and blew out the candles on the nightstand, taking the last of their light that wasn’t from a star or a moon. He began petting her hair, and just before her eyes closed, the sight of the windows at the other end of the room filled Rook with pleasant memories.

She yawned. “Remember when you snuck onto my balcony and waited for me to come to bed so you could kiss me and try to get me to break up with you?”

He paused in his strokes. “You… that’s not quite how I remember it.”

Rook’s giggles drifted farther away, out of the reach of his rationalizations. The last thing she heard before everything was still and black was Thom whispering into her ear. “You _are_ confounding, and I love you.”


End file.
